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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26433943">Frozen Memories</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/justafandomfollower/pseuds/justafandomfollower'>justafandomfollower</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Stargirl (TV 2020)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Awesome Dad Pat Dugan, Fluff, Gen, JSA mention, Post-Season/Series 01, Protective Courtney, Team Bonding</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-09-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-09-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 04:15:06</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>5,940</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26433943</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/justafandomfollower/pseuds/justafandomfollower</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Pat, Courtney's noticed, has a bad habit of downplaying his capabilities and contributions. She does her best to prove that he doesn't need to, and that he's just as much a part of the team as the rest of them.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Pat Dugan &amp; Courtney Whitmore</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>29</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Frozen Memories</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>For all that Pat is a genius when it comes to mechanics and electronics and robotics – he built a <em>flying suit of armor </em>out of <em>car parts</em>, all on his own – he doesn’t seem all that up to date on modern technology. He likes to stick with old cars as much as possible, and he uses a flip phone rather than a smart phone, and he prefers to put pen to paper as much as possible, rather than resorting to typing something out on a computer. Despite the years in which she’s known him, and the months in which she’s really come to regard him as her father, Courtney still doesn’t really know if his old-fashioned tendencies are really a matter of him never having adapted to changing technology, or if it’s just a matter of preference.</p>
<p>She’d managed to ask him one time a few weeks ago about the flip phone, when he’d used it to send STRIPE away on autopilot, jokingly prodding him about being stuck in the stone ages. He’d only grinned right back at her and rattled off the benefits – sturdier in a fight, less traceable, less likely to be stolen, etc., etc. Not to mention that it’d been the first device he’d added STRIPE’s interface too, and he’d just never bothered to change it. All true facts, Courtney’d figured then, but the brief exchange hadn’t given her any more insight into whether or not his old-fashioned nature is a matter of preference or a lack of adaptability.</p>
<p>Knowing Pat, she’s been leaning toward the former, even if she really can’t picture Pat using social media. Regardless of his reasoning behind it, when she comes down to the kitchen as he’s cooking dinner and his laptop is open on the kitchen island, it catches her interest. It’s a big, clunky thing at <em>least </em>five years old, but Pat never seems to have any problems with it. He certainly never talks about needing a new one.</p>
<p>Granted, that might just be because he rarely uses it. As far as Courtney has been able to tell, he goes online for three primary reasons: to find parts and supplies for the Pit Stop, to do research for the JSA, or some combination of the two, now that the Pit Stop’s back room has become their official training center.</p>
<p>“What’s this?” she asks, sliding onto a stool beside the island as she turns the laptop toward her.</p>
<p>“Fettucine alfredo,” Pat answers absentmindedly, absorbed in tending to the three pots on the stove. They’ve already said their greetings when she’d come home from school earlier, so Courtney doesn’t mind the distracted response. She and Pat are plenty comfortable with each other these days – sometimes she’ll do her homework at the Pit Stop without the others present, while Pat tinkers with his latest repair, and neither of them minds the silence that settles gently between them in those moments.</p>
<p>Mike’s upstairs, probably working on his latest electronics kit – he’d taken an interest after coming face to face with STRIPE for the first time, and learning that his father had been the one to build it. Mom’s still at work, and the rest of the JSA isn’t here yet. It’s just them for the moment, and there’s no pressure on either of them to get anything done.</p>
<p>Courtney only hums absentmindedly back in response, barely noticing that Pat hadn’t actually answered the question she’d meant to ask. She’s already too engrossed in whatever’s on his screen. The Word document he has open is named with a long combination of letters and numbers that probably means something technical, and usually she wouldn’t bother to give something like that a second glance, but there’re three letters in a row near the front of the document name that catch her eye: JSA.</p>
<p>If this is something he’s writing up on the JSA, she wants to know about it. It’s not really snooping, right? Not if he’s left the document open on his laptop, which he left in the middle of the kitchen? Not if it’s about the JSA? They’re both equally involved in it now. She has a right to know.</p>
<p>Except the only problem with that is that the document isn’t much more comprehensible than the title, at least not the portion of it Pat’s left it open to, so the technical term for what she’s doing doesn’t really matter. It’s all capital letters and numbers, acronyms maybe that she doesn’t recognize, with only a few full words thrown in here and there. The cursor’s blinking on a paragraph of text that starts the following way:</p>
<p>ST-5: tm: 1600-1800; CS&amp;HG, E/NE T5 + R33/R34/R35, no fd; GG&amp;CT, E T4 + R30/R31/R32, rc: msc chem sup; __ W/SW T5 + R36/R37/R38, fd: msc furn</p>
<p>Courtney can’t make heads or tails of it.</p>
<p>“How’s your homework going?”</p>
<p>Courtney looks up to find Pat taking a break from tending to the stove, looking at her with a mild expression on his face as he waits for his response. He’s wearing his usual button-down and casual slacks and there’s a kitchen towel over his shoulder and a stirring spoon in his hand. He couldn’t look more like a dad if he tried.</p>
<p>“What?” she asks. Her brain takes a moment to refocus on the kitchen and process what he’s asking of her, pulling away from the strange document on the laptop. “Oh. Almost done. Beth said she’d look over my English paper for me, and Rick’s getting pretty good at chemistry, so we were all gonna study together if we have time after training.” He might only have started diving into it to break his father’s code, but Rick’s developed a knack for recognizing chemical formulas and balancing equations that he doesn’t seem to have an interest in squashing anytime soon.</p>
<p>She spins the laptop around again, returning it to how she found it so that it’s facing Pat. “What’s this?” she asks, before he can respond to her own words.</p>
<p>“Hmm?” Pat looks over her with interest before his eyes settle on the laptop screen. “Oh. Just writing up a report on the tunnels.”</p>
<p>“The tunnels?” That’s what all the weird combinations of letters and numbers mean? “Why? We chased the ISA out of Blue Valley – what’s left of them at least.”</p>
<p>“But the tunnels are still there,” Pat answers practically. He doesn’t seem nearly as engrossed in the conversation as she is, turning slightly to give one of the pots a stir.</p>
<p>Interest consumes Courtney though, partially because of the weird formatting of the document, partially because of Pat’s typical casual tone, but mostly because this is JSA business. “So? It’s not like anyone’s using them anymore.” She would know. <em>Pat </em>certainly knows. He’d made them search every inch of those tunnels after the mess with the ISA had settled. Granted, he’d been searching right alongside them the entire time, but it’d still been weeks of nearly pointless work. Courtney understands the need, technically, but that hadn’t changed the fact that they hadn’t found anything, or that the work had been tedious.</p>
<p>“Not now they’re not,” Pat agrees easily. “But it’s important to keep a record of everything we found.”</p>
<p>Okay. Courtney supposes that makes sense. They’ve got the first Hourman’s map – his own record – and they’d proven that there hadn’t been any expansions of the tunnels in the time since he’d mapped it out, so there hadn’t been much to do there, but the ISA hadn’t had time to <em>completely </em>empty all their belongings. Maybe there is something significant in what they’d left behind. Courtney doubts it, but it’s possible.</p>
<p>“Alright,” she says. “But why’s it in code?”</p>
<p>Pat glances at the screen again, as if refreshing his own memory. “Well, it’s not code, exactly,” he clarifies. “It’s shorthand. Quicker to write, and it <em>does </em>obscure the meaning a bit if you’re not familiar with it – I try not to use anything too obvious – but it wouldn’t hold up under analysis the way a true code would.”</p>
<p>He says it like it’s obvious. His tone is calm and gentle, the tone he takes whenever there’s a “teaching moment” he wants to pass on to all of them – by obvious, Courtney doesn’t mean he’s acting like <em>‘Duh, how do you not know this?’</em>. No, it’s more like it’s just a fact of life to him. Water is wet. The sky is blue. Write your reports on your super-secret superhero activities in shorthand to make them a bit more difficult for an outsider to understand.</p>
<p>That’s the thing about Pat – nothing seems to <em>faze </em>him in the slightest. Wildcat’s suit changed shape to fit Yolanda? Well, yeah, that was what it did. An owl had taken a liking to Beth because she wore Doctor Mid-Nite’s goggles? Sure, just another day. Her Staff was more or less sentient? Yeah, he’s known that for years. He built a robot that can fly out of <em>car parts</em>? Why not?</p>
<p>Pat’s been involved in the superhero life since he was <em>twenty</em>. Courtney’s not really sure there’s anything out there that can surprise him anymore. He keeps surprising her though.</p>
<p>She knows he’s smart and knowledgeable, not just about mechanics and robotics but about the minutia of being a superhero. The in-depth lecture he’d given on first aid alone – over the course of several days – had surprised all of them. And then there’s been the other topics so far, like how to calm down a panicking civilian, or what to do if you have to deal with the police, and a bunch of other scenarios she’d never even considered until Pat had sat them all down to talk about them. Courtney knows there’s still probably a hundred more little things he hasn’t told them yet.</p>
<p>Not on purpose – their family doesn’t keep secrets from each other, not anymore – but just because he hasn’t had the time yet. Pat has thousands and thousands of stories he could tell them and Courtney (and not just her) wants to hear every one of them. She still needs to find the time to properly ask him about the origin story of her staff, and Mike loves hearing stories about every little trinket their father has built, and Rick soaks up stories about his parents, and Yolanda enjoys hearing about Wildcat too, nevermind that she has no real connection with the other man besides the use of his costume. Even Beth, who can hear most of the stories about the JSA from Chuck, eagerly plops herself down and turns wide eyes onto Pat when he really gets started.</p>
<p>Making reports about their missions makes sense. It surprises her – it’s not something she would have thought of – but it makes sense. The fact that Pat has already been doing it, and hasn’t mentioned it (not to her at least) is a bit more unsettling. It’s not really a secret, she supposes – he’s not hiding it – but she can’t help but wonder why he hasn’t said anything. The Word document in front of her is ten pages long already, and the shorthand’s supposed to be, well, shorter.</p>
<p>“Did you come up with the code yourself? I mean, the shorthand?”</p>
<p>“No,” Pat says. “Well, I mean, not recently. I came up with a fair bit of it back when we joined the JSA. They were a lot more formal than the SSV and I wrote up a lot of the reports back then, at least for the missions that Starman and I were a part of.”</p>
<p>He gives her a gentle look at the frown on her face, as if he understands the pit that’s settled in her stomach. “It gets easier to understand the more you work with it,” he says.</p>
<p>That’s not it. Well, Courtney <em>does </em>want to know everything – he <em>is </em>going to teach her this – but that’s not what she’s upset about.</p>
<p>The thing is, she still doesn’t know if she’s blowing things out of proportion, but sometimes she really doesn’t like the way Pat talks about the old JSA. He’s never bitter about it, he’s always nostalgic – it’s not his <em>tone </em>that upsets her, it’s what he says. It’s pictures he’s never in, and stories where he sits on the sidelines or holds down the fort. Or handles all the paperwork, apparently.</p>
<p>And it’s not that she doesn’t respect all the effort and time all that must have taken. <em>She </em>knows perfectly well by now how valuable he is to their team, as a mentor, a coach, a father figure, as someone to help them up when they’re feeling down and patch up their wounds after a rough battle and fight by their side when they need him. As a man with decades of experience and a level head in the face of even the worst danger. She’s just not sure the JSA knew.</p>
<p>Maybe she <em>is </em>blowing things out of proportion. Maybe Pat shares the stories of him sitting on the sidelines as opposed to stories of him in the thick of things because he doesn’t want to tell them the more dangerous tales. Maybe it’s because he thinks they’re more interested in their predecessors – in Starman, Wildcat, Doctor Mid-Nite, and Hourman – than they are in his old exploits. Maybe he’s not even aware of what he’s doing. Maybe there are a hundred completely benign explanations for the way he talks about the JSA, and Courtney just doesn’t have all the information.</p>
<p>Pat certainly talks like there was nothing bad about his relationship with the members of the old JSA. He’d told her that there was honor, in being a sidekick, and he’d meant it. She’s just not sure he knows that being a <em>sidekick </em>doesn’t mean he wasn’t also an <em>equal</em>.</p>
<p>The front door opening cuts off her thoughts, before she can rally her mind and decide what to say next, and she glances behind her to see Rick give her a small wave. Giving Pat a look – this conversation isn’t over – she slips from her stool to greet him. Despite his brash and angry nature, Rick slips into a meek, uncertain, polite teenager whenever he stops by their house. He’s getting better – it’d taken him weeks before he’d been comfortable enough to just walk in without knocking first – but he’s still more comfortable if they don’t let him wander freely through their home when no one else is around.</p>
<p>Talking with Pat at the Pit Stop, as Hourman, is one thing, but apparently eating dinner with her family and having free reign of her house is something else entirely, and something that Rick doesn’t take to naturally. He’d been weirdly polite the first time they’d had him over for dinner, nevermind that he’d fought supervillains with <em>both </em>her parents, and the hesitance hadn’t suited him at all.</p>
<p>Courtney wishes she could take credit for the way he’s opened up in the Whitmore-Dugan household since then, but her parents really deserve the bulk of it. Especially Pat, given how often Mom isn’t home until just before dinner’s about to be served. By now, everyone knows at least the bare basics of the way his uncle treats him, so it’s no surprise he acts like he’s never had a friendly family meal before.</p>
<p>“Hey,” he says softly as she moves to greet him. He slips his shoes off at the door, none of his old hesitation about getting comfortable present.</p>
<p>“Hey,” she returns. “Pat was just telling me all about the JSA’s old files,” she says, raising her voice at the end so Pat can hear her from the kitchen.</p>
<p>“I see how it is,” Pat replies as they rejoin him. “You just want to get a source of stories about the JSA without having to rely on me.”</p>
<p>He doesn’t mean anything by it – can’t possibly know the way her thoughts had been going only a few moments ago. His tone is jovial and joking. She’s pretty sure he enjoys telling them some stories as much as they enjoy hearing them. But his words don’t make the pit in Courtney’s stomach any lighter. She doesn’t know what to say to reassure him that the new JSA will always need him – she’s not even sure he really even needs to be reassured.</p>
<p>Rick speaks before she can say anything. “The old JSA kept records?”</p>
<p>Pat raises his eyebrows at the both of them. “Where do you think all the information Dr. McNider tells Beth comes from?”</p>
<p>Courtney shrugs. She’d never really thought about that. A lot of what Chuck tells Beth comes from freely available information – the internet, public records, things the goggles can see that others can’t. Of the more restricted information, she guesses she’d assumed most of that was from hacking. DMV records, medical records… But he’d had a lot of information on the ISA too, she supposes, the kind that she doubts is in any record. Except apparently the JSA’s.</p>
<p>“Well he was there, wasn’t he? When you guys fought the ISA?”</p>
<p>Pat gives a soft chuckle. “Yeah, he was there. But we also kept files – not everyone went on every mission, you know, and not everyone could attend every briefing. So we kept records.”</p>
<p>“You mean <em>you </em>kept records,” Courtney says, a little bitter.</p>
<p>The confused look Pat gives her means he has absolutely no idea what she’s upset about. But she’d be dead ten times over if it wasn’t for him, and he’s not going to get stuck doing all the paperwork all over again. (<em>If </em>that’s how it was in the JSA, Courtney forces herself to remember. She still doesn’t know the full picture.)</p>
<p>But Yolanda is at the door next, and Beth’s right behind her, so everyone gets caught up in hellos for a short while until suddenly Mike’s downstairs too, and the kitchen is suddenly very crowded.</p>
<p>“Need any help, Mr. Dugan?” Beth asks brightly, grinning up at him.</p>
<p>Pat grins back at her. “Sure, Beth,” he agrees. “Start by straining the pasta for me?”</p>
<p>“Sure thing, Mr. Dugan!” Beth chirps back, already moving to get the colander out of its cupboard.</p>
<p>Courtney feels a momentary flush of shame that <em>she </em>hadn’t offered to help with dinner, but she reminds herself that Beth likes to cook. Pat knows that as much as the rest of them. Besides, he hadn’t asked for help and might have insisted he didn’t need any if anyone other than Beth were to ask.</p>
<p>(<em>He never asks for help,</em> her thoughts whisper, and once again her mind’s off dinner and back to the JSA.)</p>
<p>“Did you guys know the old JSA kept records of their missions?” Rick asks the room at large.</p>
<p>“Really?” Mike asks eagerly.</p>
<p>“Yeah, I knew that,” Beth says, distracted by her task.</p>
<p>“What?” Yolanda asks, like she doesn’t see the significance.</p>
<p>Pat gives the room a once over, at least a head taller than pretty much everyone there but Rick. “You know that this calls for? I think we need another field trip to JSA Headquarters.”</p>
<p>Mike jumps, giving a triumphant fist pump. “Yes! Field trip!”</p>
<p>“Really?” Rick asks eagerly.</p>
<p>“When?” Yolanda asks.</p>
<p>The look Pat gives Yolanda in response is soft and understanding, and she shifts uncomfortably under the weight of it. Courtney can’t blame her. She’s been face to face with Pat’s understanding looks plenty of times by now, and he always seems to see straight through her. It’s somehow scary and reassuring at the same time, which is actually a pretty fitting description of her new dad.</p>
<p>“If you can’t get away this weekend,” he says easily, “we’ll do it next weekend. Or I can always take the trip myself and bring back a few of the files for you guys to read.”</p>
<p>“Oh. Uh. Thanks, uh, thanks Pat.”</p>
<p>Pat’s smile is soft.</p>
<p>“Did my dad write his own reports?” Rick asks, and the conversation turns to the original Hourman, and Pat telling more stories of the old JSA as Barbara comes home and Courtney and Yolanda set the table and the seven of them sit down for dinner, but Courtney doesn’t let herself forget what prompted these conversations in the first place.</p>
<hr/>
<p>“Oh yeah, road trip!” Mike crows enthusiastically. He’s been talking about little else since the idea was first suggested. “Shotgun!” He races for the passenger’s seat of the van Pat’s renting just for this trip.</p>
<p>“You sure we can’t fly?” Courtney finds herself asking with a grin, only half joking in the face of Mike’s excitement. She’s got the Staff – surely Pat can fit everyone else on STRIPE, right?</p>
<p>But Beth’s already eagerly climbing into the backseat and Rick follows after her with a resigned but fond look, a little too quick for him to be anything but eager too. Courtney glances back at her parents as Yolanda grabs one of the two middle seats.</p>
<p>“You sure you don’t want to come?” Pat’s asking Mom.</p>
<p>Mom just grins back softly. “Plenty to do here,” she assures him. “I’m good.” Courtney’s glad to know that that seems to be the truth these days. Her mom has adapted wonderfully into their new lives, and she’s more or less welcomed Pat back with open arms. They’re as in love as they ever were, and maybe a little more – Pat still looks at Mom like she hung the stars in the sky sometimes, which, ugh, Courtney doesn’t really need to be thinking about that, but now sometimes Mom looks at Pat with awe in her eyes too, whenever he tells stories about his past.</p>
<p>Which is not to say that Mom hadn’t been head over heels for him before – Courtney’d been able to recognize that they were a good fit for each other long before she’d really come to see Pat as her dad – it’s just… it’s a little different now. Courtney can’t blame her mom for that; she’s not the only one a little in awe of Pat, these days.</p>
<p>She slips into her seat as Pat kisses Mom goodbye and is buckling herself in by the time Pat slips into the driver’s seat.</p>
<p>“Everybody good?” he asks, glancing back at all of them. “Seatbelts on? Someone grabbed the lunches?”</p>
<p>“All good,” Courtney says, indicating the cooler at her feet. She almost – <em>almost </em>– slips the word <em>Dad</em> in at the end of her sentence, but for all that she sees herself as his daughter, and for all that he’s really been the only father she’s ever known, she’s never actually called him dad to his face. Not yet.</p>
<p>He grins at her, then moves his gaze to the rest of the van. “Got everything? Everyone went to the bathroom already?”</p>
<p>Mike elbows him, reaching across the space between their seats to do so. “We’re not driving to Florida! C’mon, Dad, let’s go!”</p>
<p>“We’re all good back here, Mr. Dugan,” Beth assures him.</p>
<p>Pat just chuckles, ruffling Mike’s hair – “Hey!” – before he starts up the van.</p>
<p>Despite Courtney’s trepidations, the drive over is actually pretty fun. Truthfully, she and the others in the new JSA haven’t known each other that long, so they still have plenty to talk about and share with each other, and Pat’s always good for a story now that everyone knows the truth. The group gasps as one in all the right places, and Pat talks about superpowers and magic and villains like they’re everyday things, and it’s <em>fun</em>. (And even if they had already shared all their stories, Courtney can admit now that they’re all good enough friends – all of them, not just her and the other new members of the JSA – that they would still have had fun. Plus, with Beth around, awkward silences seem like a thing of the past.)</p>
<p>But Courtney’s also on a mission today, and this time she’s not going to let herself be distracted.</p>
<hr/>
<p>As eager as everyone is to dive into the numerous files – and stories – stored at the JSA Headquarters, it doesn’t work out quite like that. Instead they spend an hour exploring, Rick lightly drifting his fingers over every inch of his father’s office, Mike bouncing from room to room, Courtney and Yolanda and Beth a bit more sedate but no less excited. The central room Pat had shown her during her first visit is impressive, but it’s far from all there is. There’s more than one training room, some with equipment perfectly tailored to certain member’s powers. Courtney gets caught up in one with gymnastics equipment, and Yolanda joins her. She has a bit more trouble maintaining her balance without the Wildcat costume, but she doesn’t let that deter her, and Courtney has fun teaching her friend some basic moves.</p>
<p>There’s a kitchen, a break room with worn couches, a locker room with showers, storage for both paper files and physical objects… It’s a little depressing, honestly, to see the furniture covers over everything, to imagine Pat and Rex going through the rooms one by one, everyone else gone, covering up what was left behind. Pat certainly seems bittersweet about the visit, a sad smile on his face as he watches their excitement.</p>
<p>They don’t have all day though, so when Pat calls them together for lunch he hands out a few files he specifically picked out. “There’s not as much shorthand in some of these,” he tells them as they dive onto the sandwiches and squabble good-heartedly over who gets which bag of chips. “But I can start teaching you the most common phrases before we get started.”</p>
<p>It’s the perfect time to ask a question.</p>
<p>“Have you been writing reports for all our missions so far?” Courtney asks. “Not just the tunnels?”</p>
<p>Pat doesn’t spot the ulterior motive in her words. “Lately I’ve been trying to. Although, aside from your confrontations with the ISA, there hasn’t been much to write about.”</p>
<p>That’s true enough. “You mean <em>our </em>confrontations,” Courtney corrects him.</p>
<p>Pat frowns at her, more amused by her correction than concerned.</p>
<p>“You’ve been writing mission reports on us?” Beth cuts in, eyes a little wide. Right – only Rick had been present for that part of the conversation before they’d devolved into discussing old JSA records.</p>
<p>“Trying to,” Pat repeats. “Been awhile since I’ve been in the habit of doing it. I almost need this refresher on shorthand as much as you guys do.”</p>
<p>“Maybe we can help out,” Courtney offers. From the look Pat gives her, she knows her words have come out a little too insistent, a little too much like a demand, but he doesn’t call her out on it.</p>
<p>Instead he just raises his eyebrows. “If you really want to,” he agrees, bemused.</p>
<p>“It’s part of being a superhero, right?” Courtney shoots back. “I mean, we’re already doing briefings. Shouldn’t we be writing our own reports too?” Patience isn’t really Courtney’s strong suit – one of the reasons she and the Staff get along so well, Pat’s joked. She’s been waiting <em>days </em>to talk about this, to figure out why Pat has been keeping this from them. From her.</p>
<p>Pat still seems a little concerned, but he still doesn’t push. He’ll probably corner her later, when they’re alone, and Courtney isn’t looking forward to that – she’s not about to admit to the thoughts running through her mind when she isn’t even sure if they’re true, and when she can barely put them into words herself – but he stays calm as he navigates what he probably thinks is a volatile mood. It isn’t <em>him </em>she’s mad at, not really, so Courtney tries to calm down and not act so riled up.</p>
<p>“If you guys want to learn now, I’d be happy to teach you. I was just sort of saving this stuff until we covered the more important topics.”</p>
<p>Okay, so, Courtney can see his point there. For all their success with the ISA, learning how to actually fight crime together was pretty important, and she can’t blame him for moving his lessons on first aid in the field to the top of the list. Still. It’s been <em>months</em>.</p>
<p>“Yeah,” she cuts in, before anyone else can say anything. “But you’ve already taught us how to fight.” The basics, at least. They’re still training. “We should start writing our own reports.” She gives her friends a look to stop them from arguing with her. Beth doesn’t seem to have caught on to the tension, Yolanda looks amused at Courtney’s stubbornness, Rick looks hesitant to get in the middle of things, and Mike just looks at her like she’s crazy. None of them say anything though.</p>
<p>Pat just eyes her carefully. “Sure,” he agrees, as if he’s not sure if she’s trying to get something out of this that he just can’t see coming. She <em>is</em>, but that something is the knowledge that they respect him, and she doesn’t want him to be stuck doing paperwork again (if he ever was stuck in the first place), so… Tough. He’ll just have to puzzle it out on his own, until Courtney figures out how to put it into words.</p>
<p>“Anyway,” she says, cutting through the tension in the room. “You were gonna teach us some shorthand.”</p>
<p>“Right.” He hesitates for a moment longer, watching her, then sets the matter aside and pulls out a notepad. “The most important thing about shorthand…”</p>
<hr/>
<p>Predictably, Pat corners her before they head out, asking if she’s doing alright, but she waves him off and tries to come up with a good explanation. She thinks she says something about wanting to live up to the old JSA and needing a way to communicate with her friends over text, and it’s easy enough to wave aside her previous tone as impatience, because that’s pretty much true.</p>
<p>Still, despite the fact that learning to write their own reports is now on the agenda – and despite the really cool files of old mission reports Pat had shared with them – it doesn’t feel like <em>enough</em>. She gets a proper idea a few days later, when she takes one of the files they’d brought back with them out of the chest in the basement and Pat’s old picture of the JSA flutters to the ground on accident.</p>
<p>It’s a well-worn photo. Well-cared for too, but the crease indicates that it’s been folded and refolded many times over. She can remember when she’d found Pat on the front porch, nothing but the photo in his hands. Courtney hadn’t really gotten it back then but she’s got her own team now. She knows enough now to know that she still can’t really comprehend the sheer grief Pat must feel when he sees his old friends. If she were to lose the others, all on the same day…</p>
<p>It’s no wonder the picture means so much to Pat. It’s no wonder he was so reluctant to let her get involved.</p>
<p>Courtney’s eyes settle on Starman for a while, searching for something, though she doesn’t know what. What would he think, to see Pat now?</p>
<p>What would he think of the teenager who’s taken up his Staff?</p>
<p>She moves on, gaze flickering over the others. The original Wildcat. Rick’s dad. Doctor Mid-Nite, Chuck’s goggles secure on his face. All dead now. All except the man who took the picture.</p>
<p><em>He’s better than all of you</em>, Courtney thinks, and she knows it’s a stupid thought. For one, she’s criticizing the dead. For another, she’s never met these men. She never will. But from the way Pat talks about them, they were all heroes in their own right, all good people, striving to do what was right at great personal cost. Still, <em>he’s better than all of you, </em>Courtney can’t help but think, because she <em>does </em>know Pat, and she knows that he’s going to be a part of her team more than he ever was a part of theirs, because she won’t be the one who pushes him to the side.</p>
<p>(She’s blaming dead men for faults that might not even exist, but Courtney doesn’t <em>care</em>. Pat deserves better. He hadn’t deserved to see his friends die like that.)</p>
<p>Staring at the photo in her hands, Courtney finally comes up with the best way to <em>show </em>that, without ever having to say a word.</p>
<hr/>
<p>“What’s going on, Court?” Pat asks as she tugs him to the back room of the Pit Stop. There’s exasperation in his tone, but it’s fond and soft and he doesn’t tug back against her grip on his arm.</p>
<p>“Just, c’mon,” she insists. “We want to take a picture of the new JSA. I grabbed Mike’s camera.” Mike’ll be pissed that he’s not in the shot, but Courtney fully agrees with Pat about waiting until he’s older to get him fully involved. He’ll be in one of them one of these days, she’s sure of that.</p>
<p>Inside the back room, they come to a halt as Pat takes in the others, already in their costumes and waiting. “You want me to take a picture of you guys?”</p>
<p>“Just like the old JSA!” Beth chimes in cheerfully, because by now they’ve all seen the photo at least once. Pat keeps it close, but he hadn’t hesitated to show them the old image of their predecessors.</p>
<p>“And we don’t want you to <em>take </em>the picture,” Courtney counters. “We want you to <em>be </em>in it.”</p>
<p>Pat frowns at her, like he doesn’t understand why she would want him in the picture. Or maybe he’s just confused about her springing it on him out of the blue, but she’d wanted it to be a surprise. “What?”</p>
<p>“We’re taking the picture,” Rick says. “Just go along with it.” His tone is a little too disgruntled – he doesn’t need to be <em>that </em>obvious that this wasn’t his idea – but he’s in full costume, so Courtney can’t complain too much. Besides, it’s obvious he’s trying to hide his smile, especially when he glances over at a very excited Beth.</p>
<p>“C’mon, Mr. Dugan,” Beth says eagerly, patting STRIPE’s leg. “We were thinking that STRIPE could go down on one knee to fit in the frame, and that Rick and I could stand to the right, or well, STRIPE’s left, and then Courtney and Yolanda can stand to the left, Rick and Courtney in the middle.”</p>
<p>Pat seems frozen for a moment, gaze roving over all of them, before he turns to her at his side. Of all of them, he knows perfectly well that she’s the one who understands what that original photo means to him the most. “Courtney…” he says softly, a suspicious shimmer in his eyes.</p>
<p>“Shut up,” Courtney says, shoving him forward. She wants him to know how she feels – more than just the mug could say, because he’s her dad, yeah, and that’s <em>important</em> (it’s beyond important; she’d never realized how wonderful it would be to have a father who’s always there for her), but he’s also her sidekick and mentor and a hero in his own right, and he needs to know that too – but that doesn’t mean she’s equipped to deal with the emotional fallout. “Just get in the robot.”</p>
<p>She’s grinning though, and she won’t meet his eyes, so she’s pretty sure he knows what she means anyway.</p>
<p>(They can’t hang the picture, but it goes in the trunk right alongside the other one, and if Pat’s eyes get a little wet sometimes when he looks at it, well, Courtney won’t tell. She doesn’t need any more evidence of how proud he is of them. She only needs him to know that the feeling’s mutual.)</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I was very much a fan of the first season of Stargirl, so I've got a lot of ideas for fics. This one was wonderfully beta read by @thepalatine over on tumblr. She was a great help in bouncing ideas off of and has some wonderful thoughts on many different aspects of the show - go check out her tumblr if you want more Stargirl content!</p>
<p>This fic supposes that the JSA HQ is within driving distance for a day trip, and takes place some nebulous time after the end of the first season. I'd love to hear your thoughts on it, and feel free to message me on tumblr if you want to talk about the show (my tumblr username is the same as my AO3 handle). </p>
<p>Thanks for reading!</p></blockquote></div></div>
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